


Words to Live By

by Merfilly



Series: 100 Fandoms Challenge [77]
Category: Time Enough for Love - Robert A. Heinlein
Genre: Community: 100fandoms, Drabble, Family Bonding, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-01
Updated: 2019-07-01
Packaged: 2020-06-02 05:48:30
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 100
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19435171
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Merfilly/pseuds/Merfilly
Summary: A conversation from when Lazarus was still a boy.





	Words to Live By

**Author's Note:**

> Prompt - 31. courage

"Any man that tells you he's not afraid is lying or stupid," Ira Johnson told his grandson. "You can't be brave without knowing fear, accepting it, and swallowing it to do what is needed anyway."

Woodrow Wilson Smith, the future Lazarus Long, took those words and put them where they'd stick in his brain. 

"What if being afraid is because you know you can't win?" he asked.

Ira, or Gramps to this boy, looked at him squarely. "Sometimes what is needed is knowing not to fight right then."

Those words were remembered too, over the long years of his life.

**Author's Note:**

> As I share Heinlein's birthday, I decided to do a week of drabbles from his novels.


End file.
